Gulfstream Aerospace Corp., the manufacturer of the business jet that crashed on takeoff last year and killed Philadelphia businessman Lewis Katz and six others, has acknowledged to investigators that a key fail-safe system on the plane has a flawed design. Gulfstream tested its fleet of GIV jets after the fatal accident and found a widespread problem: The planes could travel down the runway at takeoff speeds even when they had no ability to leave the ground. To win safety certification, the firm had promised the Federal Aviation Administration that its fail-safe design would prevent pilots from getting the jet above...

Until you get to know Sean D. Tucker, it's hard to understand why he chooses to make a living by risking his life. But take a moment to watch what he does. It's magical. Watch him fly hundreds of miles an hour and thousands of feet high -- twirling, tumbling and twisting his airplane in ways you never thought possible ... Tucker is an aerobatic pilot -- among the best in the world. He calls it a form of art ...

In the forward galley area near the L1 door and flight deck, a small access panel sits below the carpet which acts as the gateway to the 777’s electronics and engineering bay. The bay, referred to as the ‘E/E bay’, contains many of the 777’s extremely sensitive systems. A recently posted YouTube video, below, shows how shockingly easy it is to access the E/E bay, and how seemingly little has been done to keep people out. The systems in the E/E bay vary from fuse panels to the Airplane Information Management System (AIMS), also known as “the brains” of the...

A private jet owned by a North Texas company has been impounded for the past 2 1/2 weeks and its passengers and crew detained by the Congolese government in central Africa, where officials say it was used to smuggle gold from rebel territories in the nation's eastern provinces. The plane was leased by Southlake Aviation, based in suburban Dallas-Fort Worth, to a subsidiary of CAMAC International, The Dallas Morning News reported in its Sunday editions. CAMAC company is owned by Kase Lawal, a Nigerian-born Houston oil tycoon an appointee of President Barack Obama to the Advisory Committee for Trade Policy...

A French aviation expert believes he may have found the wreckage of MH370 – the Malaysia Airlines flight which disappeared off the coast of Malaysia in March 2014. Xavier Tytelman, a former military pilot who now specialises in aviation security, was contacted on Wednesday morning by a man living on the island of Reunion, in the Indian Ocean. The man sent Mr Tytelman a series of photos showing wreckage of a plane, which the Frenchman said could possibly be the missing jet. "I've been studying hundreds of photos and speaking to colleagues," Mr Tytelman told The Telegraph. "And we all...

Spain's "ghost airport" - that cost hundreds of millions of euros to build and which became a notorious symbol of the excess of the country's bonanza years has been sold to a group of British and Asian investors for just €10,000 ($10,835). Ciudad Real airport airport, in the central Castilla-La Mancha region, has been closed since 2012, despite opening only four years prior to closure. The regional authorities raised an estimated €1billion in private investment to build it. They had hoped it would draw millions of visitors each year to Ciudad Real and the surrounding area, which is known as...

RUSSIAN-backed rebels in Ukraine’s east believed they had shot down a Ukraine Airforce fighter jet as disturbing new footage shows them ransacking the luggage of passengers and crew from Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17. A year ago today, 298 passengers and crew including 38 Australian citizens and residents died aboard the Kuala Lumpur bound commercial flight after it was shot down over east Ukraine, 40km from the Russian border. Much footage exists particularly on the internet of the aftermath of the downed airliner, smouldering over three main wreckage sites about the rebel stronghold of the embattled Dontesk region. But, after a...

A video uploaded to YouTube by MrJasonmx3 shows Angel #5 doing a low fly-by. While the aircraft did not appear to be at unsafe altitude, it was close enough to the ground to send tents and umbrellas flying in the air. According to reports, the maneuver was performed by Lt. Cmdr. Mark Tedrow. Tedrow is a Pennsylvania native who has been with the Blue Angels since September 2011. The performance occurred July 11.

Tomorrow Prince William joins the East Anglian Air Ambulance as a pilot Former member of RAF will ferry critically ill members of public to hospital Work is hazardous and involves night shifts but is a 'very rewarding job' Prince William, who formerly served as a RAF search-and-rescue pilot (pictured) will become an air ambulance pilot It's hazardous, it involves night shifts, staff might have to work Christmas Day and they take a packed lunch because there’s no canteen. It hardly sounds like a career fit for a prince, yet at 7am tomorrow the Duke of Cambridge reports for duty at...

Twenty-five army, navy and coast guard men -- the entire crew and passenger list of a converted Flying Fortress carrying the homeward-bound servicemen from Gander, Newfoundland -- were killed last night when the plane crashed against 1200-foot Mount Tom. Salvage crews summoned to the scene of New England's worst air disaster

The last flight for US Airways will take place this fall, and one more name in airline history will disappear. The farewell flight for US Airways will be a red-eye — Flight 434 is scheduled to leave San Francisco around 10 p.m. and land in Philadelphia after 6 a.m. on Oct. 18. The US Airways website will be turned off. Airport kiosks and signs will change to American Airlines. The two airlines merged in December 2013 and decided to keep the better-known American name. Vestiges of the carrier will survive for some time, however, as some planes won’t be repainted...

The remnants of Transcontinental Air Mail Route Beacon 37A, which was located atop a bluff in St. George, Utah. (Photo: Dppowell/Wikipedia)Across the United States, from Los Angeles to New York, lies a network of mostly forgotten infrastructure, a system that was obsolete before it was ever finished—forgotten relics from the early days of powered flight. The early 20th century was an era of American history where Manifest Destiny seemed, well, manifest. The West had been won, and the cities blossomed. But with innovation came change and obsolescence. Trains became the prime movers of not only people and goods, but also the mail. The Pony Express proved...

A military fighter jet crashed into a Cessna flight midair about 11 miles north of Charleston, South Carolina this morning, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. The condition of the pilots of the planes is unknown at this time. There have been no reports confirming any other passengers. In a statement, the FAA said the collision involved a Cessna C 150 and an F-16 fighter aircraft at around 11 a.m. A defense department official confirmed to ABC News that the pilot of the F-16 ejected safely. The plane and pilot came from Shaw Air Force Base, roughly 100 miles north...

For his new book, The Wright Brothers, ­Pulitzer Prize winner David ­McCullough pored over newspaper articles, photographs, and more than 1,000 letters to create a gripping account of Wilbur and Orville's quest to fly.

No More Free Checked Bags on JetBlue. As of June 30, the airline introduced new fare options when booking tickets online, which include charges to checked bags, unless passengers pay for its premium fares. Passengers purchasing Blue fare—JetBlue’s base fare—will now be charged $20 for the first checked bag when purchased during web check-in or at a kiosk, or $25 at the check-in counter, and a $35 fee for a second checked bag.

A test pilot has some very, very bad news about the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. The pricey new stealth jet canÂ’t turn or climb fast enough to hit an enemy plane during a dogfight or to dodge the enemyÂ’s own gunfire, the pilot reported following a day of mock air battles back in January. Â“The F-35 was at a distinct energy disadvantage,Â” the unnamed pilot wrote in a scathing five-page brief that War Is Boring has obtained. The brief is unclassified but is labeled Â“for official use only.Â” The test pilotÂ’s report is the latest evidence of fundamental problems with...

Cities and states across the U.S. regularly lobby airlines to add flights and routes, arguing that air service is vital to economic development. But one of the most important places in the country to corporations — Delaware — now has no commercial air service. The Wilmington News Journal reports that Frontier Airlines quietly dropped flights last week to Wilmington’s New Castle Airport. That leaves the state as the only one in the country where airlines do not fly. Frontier spokesman Jim Faulkner told the paper that the airline discontinued service because it wasn’t profitable. “If market conditions change, we may...

It has been claimed the chief architect of Pyongyang Airport was executed by North Korea's totalitarian leader Kim Jong-un because he disliked his designs. Ma Won-chun, who was North Korea's director of the Designing Department of the National Defence Commission, vanished last year and was allegedly executed in November. This coincided with a report the same month explaining how the fearsome ruler was dissatisfied with the construction of Terminal 2 at the country's capital city.

With no announcement or fanfare, Eastern Airlines and HavanaAir quietly moved their inaugural revenue flights, MIA-HAV-HAV flight to today. Flight 3145, departed from Miami at 2:26pm EST according to FlightAware. Return flight 3146 arrived back in Miami from Havana’s Jose Marti International Airport at 5:05pm.

Pilot Romain Jantot has one more item to add to his pre-flight checklist: always check for cats. The Daily Record reports Jantot was teaching a flying lesson in Kourou, French Guinea, when an unexpected stowaway made an appearance. After a smooth ascent, a cat creeps from its place on the wing toward the cockpit. The feline flyer seemed unfazed by its journey among the clouds, although the pilot chose to cut the trip short. Jantot uploaded the above video to YouTube on Sunday, where it has since been viewed nearly 400,000 times. He notes the carry-on cat is doing well,...

Night Witch commemorative stamps (Photo: toysworld.od.ua)In the Nazi-occupied Soviet Union, German soldiers had a very real fear of witches.Namely the Night Witches, an all-female squadron of bomber pilots who ran thousands of daring bombing raids with little more than wooden planes and the cover of night—and should be as celebrated as their male counterparts.This month marks the 73rd anniversary of the start of their pioneering service. In June of 1941, the Axis powers pushed into the Soviet Union using the largest invading force in the history of warfare. The infamous Operation Barbarossa saw over four million troops wade into Russia from...

Just thought I would share my project I have been working on for about 5 years now. I am definitely on the home stretch now, about 90% complete. I have a guy coming next week to do all the finish work on the outside, I simple do not have the patience for finish work, everything else was pretty easy, just time consuming. I already have a 200hp IO360 ready to bolt on. Gear was all installed but I had to remove to seal the fuel tanks, so Now it is on a stand. After the finisher does the top and...

Two planes began their takeoffs on intersecting runways at Chicago’s Midway airport on Tuesday evening, before being ordered to stop by air traffic control and averting a collision in the center of the airport, the FAA confirmed. The two planes involved were Southwest Flight 3828 bound for

British warplanes scrambled to intercept nine Russian aircraft within hours after they flew menacingly close to the Baltic States in what was described as the biggest act of provocation since the Cold War. Moscow sent the world’s fastest supersonic fighter jet, along with spy planes and bombers to ‘snoop’ on Nato war games designed to send a ‘warning to Vladimir Putin’. A senior RAF source last night told the Daily Mail: ‘We’ve never had a period like this in living memory.’

Beneath the panes of Perspex in her floor, the daisy-strewn runway falls away as fast as 80 years of history. The Blenheim’s snout lifts skywards, her twin engines casting a heat haze behind the propellers’ silver blur. At 200mph, she throttles towards a patchwork of cumulus and sun, quiet, quick and deft. Inside she is bare of today’s technology. Her khaki flight deck contains pedals as delicate as a piano’s, a joystick, and a small black bank of antique instruments. I am perched in the navigator’s place on a circular seat the size of a dinner plate. Above me and...

The Hungarian Air Force had its second Saab JAS 39 Gripen crash in less than a month. The latest accident three days ago was caused by the malfunctioning landing gear, which led the pilot to make an emergency landing. He stayed with the jet as long as possible, only ejecting as the stricken fighter tipped on its side, careening down the runway. During ejection, the pilot’s malfunctioning seat put him in hospital with a vertebral fracture. Squadron leader Sándor Kádár had hit the ground pretty hard since his seat didn’t detach after leaving the cockpit, weighing down his parachute by...

(CNN)—There's a famous quote: "If you did it, it ain't braggin'." Boeing did it -- in front of a camera. An eyepopping rehearsal video Boeing released Thursday shows off its newest version of the Dreamliner aircraft — the 787-9 — performing some impressive and beautiful banks and ascents.

We've come to live in an era when people don't know who may be listening or watching, even when they're on their own property. The Associated Press reported last week that the FBI has been flying over U.S. cities, spying on citizens. The FBI has developed a civilian air force, "obscured behind fictitious companies," according to AP, which traced at least 50 aircraft back to the FBI. Those planes flew more than 100 times in 11 states, over a 30-day period from late April to late May. They flew over both major cities and rural areas. Aircraft that once were...

Late on the night of June 5, 1944, a Douglas C-47 Skytrain commanded by Lt. Col. John M. Donalson launched with 15 paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division on board. They were the very tip of the Allied invasion spear, leading a formation of hundreds of aircraft carrying thousands of troops. Just after midnight on June 6, That’s All, Brother navigated through intense German fire and low clouds to drop the first Allied troops to land in Normandy, France, on D-Day, commencing Operation Overlord. Seven decades later, Staff Sgt. Matt Scales of the Alabama Air National Guard was researching Donalson’s...

The extent of corrosion damage on the U.S. military’s F/A-18 Hornet fleet is requiring more maintenance than expected, an admiral said. The Navy and Marine Corps are flying the legacy fighter jets longer than planned — 10,000 flight hours, up from 6,000 flight hours — because of delays in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, according to Rear Adm. Michael Manazir, the service’s director of air warfare. As a result, the 1980s-era, twin-engine aircraft is experiencing a high degree of wear and tear, including corrosion. “The corrosion impacts, I would say, caught us by surprise,” he said this week during...

Clint Eastwood To Make Film about Capt. Sully Sullenberger By Stephen Pope / Published: Jun 04, 2015 Warner Bros. Pictures announced on Tuesday that the life story of Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger is coming to the big screen in a yet-to-be named motion picture that will be directed by none other than Clint Eastwood. The film will be adapted from Sully's book, "Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters," co-written with Jeffery Zaslow.

Â“History,Â” it has been written, Â“does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.Â” Today itÂ’s rhyming with Gen. Billy Mitchell. In the 1920s, Mitchell challenged conventional thinking by advocating air power at sea in the face of a naval establishment dominated by battleship proponents. The hubris of the Â“battleship NavyÂ” was such that just nine days before Pearl Harbor, the official program for the 1941 Army-Navy game displayed a full page photograph of the battleship USS Arizona with language virtually extolling its invincibility. Of course, the reason that no one had yet sunk a battleship from the airâ€ŠÂ—â€Šin combatâ€ŠÂ—â€Šwas that no...

Over the weekend, Singapore Airlines Flight 836, flying from Singapore to Shanghai, lost power mid-flight on both of its Rolls-Royce engines. According to Flightradar 24, the Airbus A330-343 experienced the problem while cruising at 39,000 feet. The incident, which took place just south of Hong Kong, caused the airliner to descend 13,000 feet before the crew was able to restart the engines. The Airbus jet — registration number 9V-SSF — landed safely in Shanghai an hour and a half later. There were 182 passengers and 12 crew members on board the airliner. No injuries were reported. According to The Aviation...

ONCE in danger of being branded a costly turkey, the RAAF's Wedgetail aircraft are now flying high. AFTER more than 1200 hours directing Australian and coalition aircraft in strike missions against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, the six E-7A Wedgetail airborne early warning and control aircraft have been declared fully operationally ready. Defence Minister Kevin Andrews said Australia now had the most advanced air battle space management capability in the world. But this didn't come easy. A succession of technical problems with the aircraft's advanced radar raised concerns that the entire project could be cancelled. US aerospace company Boeing...

NEWARK — Mayor Ras Baraka has penned a letter to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and other Cabinet members, asking them to immediately stop the expansion of Middle East-based airlines into domestic markets which he says could threaten the city's airport and economy. The missive, also addressed to Transportation Secretary Anthony R. Foxx and Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, said carriers are subsidized by their governments and could cut into markets carved out by domestic outfits such as United Airlines, which provides thousands of jobs to Newark-area residents.

A specially painted Eurofighter Typhoon commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Britain has been unveiled. The jet has been painted in the colours used at the time of the battle, which ran from July to September 1940. It also bears a red devil emblem in honour of the only RAF Fighter Command pilot awarded a Victoria Cross in the conflict. It was revealed during a ceremony at RAF Coningsby, Lincolnshire. The Battle of Britain was the German air force's attempt to gain air superiority over the RAF. Their ultimate failure was one of the turning points of the...

US military scientists have invented a miniature drone that fits in the palm of a hand, ready to be dropped from the sky like a mobile phone with wings. ... With no motor and only about 10 parts, the Cicada resembles a paper airplane with a circuit board. It is designed to glide to programmed GPS coordinates after being dropped from an aircraft, a balloon or a larger drone, researchers said. ...outfitted with a range of light-weight sensors, including microphones. "They are robotic carrier pigeons. You tell them where to go, and they will go there," Edwards said.

A well-known U.S. hacker told F.B.I. agents he took momentary control of an airplane’s engines mid-flight by hacking into its inflight entertainment system, according to a document filed in U.S. federal court and obtained by APTN National News. Roberts, who has been interviewed at least three times by the F.B.I. this year, is under investigation for allegedly hacking into the electronic entertainment systems of airplanes, according to an application for a search warrant to probe seized electronic equipment. The document shows F.B.I. agents investigating Roberts believe he has the ability to do what he claims: take over flight control systems...

The Textron Scorpion costs $20 million, still not exactly a bargain by most people's standards, but a fifth of the cost of the F-35. It suggests that not every advanced defence project has to necessarily come in years late and billions over budget – and points to a new twist in not only the future of fighter-jet design, but also in more humanitarian roles that a budget jet could carry out. Textron aren’t the only ones creating the tech to address this issue. The single jet fighter JF-17 is a Chinese design, currently being built in collaboration with its sole...

Saudi Arabia has terminated its contract with the Portuguese airline Hi Fly after it flew an empty jumbo jet marked with the logo of the kingdom’s national carrier, Saudia, to Ben-Gurion Airport for repairs. The announcement was reported in the Twitter feed of a Saudi news agency. The arrival of the jet with the logo to Ben-Gurion Airport overnight Tuesday generated a stir in the Israeli media on Wednesday after surprised airport workers spotted the plane. The plane in question, an Airbus A330-300 devoid of passengers, arrived from Brussels to Tel Aviv for routine maintenance work with the Bedek Aviation...

Hosted by the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, the show brought together drone makers, military types, and business leaders from around the globe. (Google founder Larry Page was spotted briefly on the showroom floor.) All were looking for the next thing in UAV design. Here’s a look at some of the most interesting, innovative and outlandish drones Defense One ran across. 1. The SnowGoose BRAVO from Canada-based Mist Mobility Integrated Systems Technology, or MMIST, is an update to the company’s SnowGoose CQ-10A cargo drone. The original played a role in U.S. Special Operations Command missions for years. The Bravo...

... Easter had a top-secret job offer. If Moseley accepted, he would have to commit for four years, he couldn't tell anyone about the job and he would have to accept the job before knowing what it was. "And he said, 'You've got 30 seconds and if you don't say yes, this conversation never happened.' Well, that was just too intriguing to turn down," Moseley says. "So I said, 'Absolutely.' And he'd given me a telephone number and an intersection." ...

At IDEF 2015, which is held in Istanbul from 5-8 May, Italian company Oto Melara is showcasing for the first time the new 20mm Gunship for which commercial contacts with the Turkish aeronautic company TAI have already started. Gunship by Oto Melara is a palletized air-to-ground gun system, designed to be operated from military cargo aircraft, such as C130s (all versions), C27s or any other which has a standard military pallet (88’x108’) capability. Oto Melara Gunship 20 mm air-to-ground gun system at IDEF 2015 In the present day stand-alone configuration, the Gunship system is self contained in a single cargo...

When the F-15 was created, it was created to be a pure air-to-air fighter, with the philosophy of “not a pound for air-to-ground” guiding designers. So how did Israel end up turning their F-15s into deadly long-range multi-role strike aircraft well before the F-15E Strike Eagle became a reality? Here’s how. In Need Of A Game Changing Fighter Israel’s love affair with the F-15 began out of the need to procure a fighter that could trump the increasingly complex fighters that surrounding Arab states were amassing from Russian and French sources. Both the F-14 Tomcat and the F-15 Eagle were...

A series of incredible photographs showing more than 150 lost World War Two aircraft 130-feet under the Pacific Ocean has been released. The stunning images show the planes surrounded by coral and fish as they lie - sometimes vertically - on the seabed more than seven decades after they were dumped there. The find includes historic American aircraft including Douglas SBD Dauntless dive bombers, F4U Corsair and TBF/TBM Avengers.Amazingly, many of the planes have remained intact, with only a few broken tails and wings littering the floor. Brandi Mueller, from Cameron, Wisconsin, discovered the planes while scuba diving around five...

At IDEF 2015, the International Defence Industry Fair currently held in Istanbul, Turkey, local shipyard "Sedef Shipbuilding" is showcasing a model of the future Turkish Navy Landing Helicopter Dock (LHD) with the short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) variant of the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II jets on board. The same model is showcased on the Turkish Navy booth. Turkish Navy future LHD model on display at Sedef Shipyard booth during IDEF 2015 Turkey's Undersecretariat for Defense Industries (SSM) announced in December 2013 that it selected Sedef shipyard as winner of its LPD tender and that final contract negotiations with...

These incredible photos show the damage caused by a bird strike to a passenger plane. The Turkish Airlines flight from Istanbul to Nevehir in Turkey was on approach to land when it was involved in a severe hit with a unlucky bird. There were 125 passengers on board the Boeing 737-800, and there were not believed to be any injuries suffered on the landing on Tuesday.

(VIDEO-AT-LINK) The current issue surrounding personal aircraft is the cost factor. Not only do private jets that seat under a dozen people cost millions to buy, but fuel for a flight will set you back a few thousand pounds each ride. NASA is working on a way to fix that, by creating a four man battery-powered airplane capable of working as a pseudo-drone and a short flight carrier. The electric plane features 10 engines and is capable of taking off vertically, similar to a rocket. The current prototype is focused on crop overview and personal surveillance. Instead of having a...